And it’s bad news for alarmists. USA Today:
Approval or denial of the Keystone XL pipeline is unlikely to have an impact on the rate of extraction of heavy-carbon tar sands oil in Canada, according to a highly anticipated State Department review released Friday.
The release of the review now triggers a 90-day federal process for determining if the project is in the nation’s interest.
The environmental impact study should end the debate on the project, supporters of the controversial pipeline said, and President Obama should back the project that would bring oil from the tar sands of northwest Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. Congressional Republicans have been particularly vocal supporters of the pipeline.
“The Keystone XL Pipeline is the single largest shovel-ready project in America, ready to go, but for years President Obama and his hard-left allies have stalled these jobs in a maze of red tape,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a statement. “But if the president meant what he said this week about ‘a year of action,’ he’ll act now on this important project that won’t cost taxpayers a dime to build but will bring thousands of private sector jobs to Americans who desperately need them.”
A 2011 State Department report concluded that several thousand temporary construction jobs would be created by construction, in addition to a few dozen permanent jobs associated with operating the pipeline.
Environmentalists say the 1,700-mile pipeline would have a devastating impact on the environment and have pressured Obama to reject it.
The rest here.